Minium: ODU's Brock Gagliardi Opened a Recruiting Pipeline Between Norfolk and Tacoma

HATTIESBURG, Miss. – Old Dominion baseball coaches were watching video of a pitcher at Tacoma Community College in Washington, trying to figure out if he had the right stuff for them to spend the money to bring him to Norfolk on a recruiting visit.

But they kept getting distracted.

The catcher, it would seem, was even better than the pitcher. He handled the ball well, was energetic, and in control of the game. He was tough, had a rifle arm and balls in the dirt rarely got past him.

He was so good that coach Chris Finwood invited him to come along with the pitcher on an official visit.

"We didn't get the pitcher," Finwood said. "Thankfully, we got the catcher."

The catcher they got was Brock Gagliardi (pronounced Gal-ee-ardi) and, pardon the pun, he was a steal.

Brock liked ODU so much that he didn't mind that it was 3,000 miles from home. His mother, Tammy Gagliardi, winced when he returned from the trip and gushed about how he loved his visit.

"Like any mother, I was worried about my son going that far away from home," she said at ODU's Senior Day. "But it's one of the best things that ever happened to him. I'm so glad he came to ODU."

The feeling is more than mutual.

Brock was among four ODU first-team All-Conference USA picks this spring as a senior, and has been especially valuable down the stretch as the Monarchs have made a run at earning an at-large NCAA Tournament bid.


On Senior Day two weeks ago, he hit a walk-off home run to give the Monarchs a 5-4 victory over Marshall.

And Wednesday, in the first round of the Conference USA Tournament at Southern Miss, Brock hit a towering grand-slam in the fourth inning that gave the Monarchs a big lead they never surrendered during an 18-7 victory over Middle Tennessee.

He was also a key player last season, ODU's best ever. The Monarchs finished 44-16, winning their first Conference USA title ever and advancing to an NCAA Regional final, where the Monarchs lost to Virginia in extra innings.

The Monarchs head into Thursday's second-round game against Louisiana Tech (ESPN+) at 5 p.m. having won eight in a row.

Gagliardi helped open an unusual recruiting pipeline between Tacoma and ODU.

Call it a long-distance relationship that works.

Tacoma coach Ryan Mummert and Finwood have developed a close working relationship. Mummert only recommends players to Finwood he knows that can play at a high level in Division I. Finwood, for his part, makes sure those players succeed, academically and on the field.

Brock was followed by center fielder Thomas Wheeler, a junior, and by sophomore outfielder Josh Trujillo, both from Tacoma Community College.

"It's really created a neat kind of pipeline," Finwood said.

They aren't ODU's first players from Washington. Tom Scheffler, now ODU's volunteer assistant, is from Kirkland, Washington. He played at Wenatchee Valley College before transferring to ODU, where he played three seasons. 

It's not unusual for ODU to recruit players from long distance. Outfielder Andy Garriola, a senior who was named ODU's Male Athlete of the Year, is from Sierra Madre, California, while Matt Coutney, the Conference USA Player of the Year, isn't even from the United States. The first baseman was raised just south of Edmonton, Alberta in western Canada.



But for ODU to have three starters from the state of Washington is a bit unusual.

Brock said that while he liked ODU's campus and thinks Norfolk is similar to Tacoma, the attraction was ODU's coaches.

"When I came on my visit, none of the players were here," he said. "We really spent most of the trip hanging out with coach (Mike) Marron and coach (Logan) Robbins.

"It was more like the four of us hanging out like friends, talking about baseball, talking about life, than it was a recruiting visit."

Yes, he toured campus and downtown Norfolk, "but most of the trip wasn't like that. It was mostly about getting to know each other. They were already trying to get to know me, trying to build a connection.

"Coach Robbins said we don't want you to come here to be the same player you've always been and that's what I wanted to hear. You can go to a bigger school and they won't work with you. And if you don't perform well, they just kick you aside.

"He told me they aren't going to do that, that they were going to help me develop so I can have a chance to play pro ball."

He visited ODU late in the process, deciding to wait until after the June Major League Baseball draft, and while Oregon State, Purdue, Hawaii and Seattle University all offered him, none had scholarship money available so late in the process.

"I was told Oregon State was waiting for me, but when the draft ended, nothing happened," he said.

"Looking back, I'm glad nothing happened. I couldn't have thought of a better place to go."

One of the plusses of working in ODU's athletic communications office is that you get to meet a ton of college students. Some are student volunteers. Others are interns. All of them are fresh-faced and eager to learn.

Most ODU students are really good kids.



I'm an old guy and agree with former ODU basketball coach Blaine Taylor who said, shortly after he was introduced as a fundraiser, that working around young people keeps you feeling young.

At times, it can also give you some insight into one of ODU's most successful athletic teams.

Brock interned for Eric Bohannon, associate athletic director for athletic communications. Eric's office is next door to mine, and I could see Brock when my door was open.

When you watch a guy work, listen to him talk and interact with him in the office, you get a good feel for his character. Brock is a smart, polite and talented young guy who's going to succeed in life. He has a great sense of humor but also a serious commitment to work hard and obey the rules.

Brock graduated with a degree in communications earlier this month and, as internships are designed to do, was exposed to a part of the communications world that few people know about. An aside here: Eric keeps you hopping when you work for him. There's little idle time. He takes advantage of free labor.

In January and February, Brock worked dozens of men's and women's basketball games, helping to compile post-game statistics packets, delivering statistics to TV, radio and newspaper reporters and to coaches of both teams.

When he was in the office, Bohannon took advantage of Brock's interest in sports to have him do research and handle some of the necessary but mundane tasks necessary to provide our web site, and news media, with updated information on athletes.

"A lot of the time, I spent identifying the people in baseball photos," Brock said with a smile. "I would go through 150 or 200 photos. Identifying everyone in the photos was pretty easy for me. It wouldn't be as easy for someone who doesn't play on the team."

He also spent hours researching every member of the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame to identify everyone with an ODU connection. ODU coach DeLisha Milton-Jones will be inducted into the Hall of Fame in mid June.

He was even tasked with researching just how unique Blake Morgan's phenomenal performance for ODU as a freshman pitcher was this season.



"That was pretty cool, looking up stuff on someone you play with," he said. "That was fun. Blake's been such a huge part of our success."

Being a baseball catcher is one of the most grueling positions in college athletics. You crouch for hours, and although you wear a bunch of padding, it's not body armour. You get nicked and bruised by foul balls or pitches throw into the dirt.

He came into the office with bruises and injuries. If you notice that sometimes he's a little slow around the base paths, it's because he's been gritting his teeth while dealing with an at-times painful pulled hamstring.

"But even when he was injured, he showed up every day and did his work," Bohannon said. "He did some great research that we were able to give the media.

"He did a really nice job for us."

Bohannon is under the weather this week and could not make the trip to Southern Miss. We've been calling and texting pretty regularly.

How does he feel about Brock? Seconds after Brock hit the grand slam, Bohannon texted: "I'm so proud of him."

Tacoma is a scenic, port city just south of Seattle located on Pugent Sound. There are breathtaking mountain views and like Norfolk, the city has a major military presence.

Many of the homes of the city's 220,000 residents have luscious green yards, given the plentiful rainfall the Evergreen State receives. Brock was fortunate in that the Gagliardi family had a huge backyard, one big enough for young kids to play baseball.  

Brock's father, Mike Gagliardi, didn't pressure him to play baseball. He just led by example.

"As soon as I could walk, I had a bat and ball," Brock said. "He told me, you don't have to play. But I loved playing with him.

"My dad would go out there and throw me balls for hours. That's when I began to love the game. Playing at the college level is so hard, you can fail so much. There are many times when I think about being in that back yard, hitting the ball with my dad and just having fun."

Brock was a high school baseball star but did not excel academically.



"I struggled in the classroom," he said. "I was more focused on baseball and my social life. For whatever reason, I was more focused on baseball and my social life."

That ended when he began playing for Mummert. Going to class, doing your homework, being on time and being a good citizen were prioritized over baseball.

"Even if I had done well academically in high school, I would go to junior college again," he said. "I learned a lot about myself. I got to play two years of baseball where at the Division I level, it's difficult to play your first two years."

He lived at home, where he was able to do his laundry, get home-cooked meals and feel comfortable.

"I loved being at home," he said. "You don't realize how good you have it until you leave home."

But when it came to going to a four-year college, "I was ready to go out and explore," he said.

"I really hadn't been outside of Washington very much. I loved the Norfolk area because it reminded me of home. And the history here. There's so much I haven't been able to experience all I want to experience.

"I knew I'd have to grow up and do things on my own. So why not do it while playing college baseball?"

His college baseball career will soon end. He hopes to be drafted by a Major League Baseball team. If not, he has a communications degree, and thanks to
Bohannon, a perspective of how hard, and how rewarding, it can be to work behind the scenes for a communications team.

"I don't know yet what I want to do, but I want it to be in sports," he said. "Working in the office with Eric, I didn't even know that whole side of sports really existed.

"I had no idea all the work that goes on behind the scenes. I thought it was really cool, and something I could see myself doing.

"I've learned so much while I've been at ODU. I love my coaches and teammates.

"I think back to what might have been and am so glad things worked out the way they did."